My God, how good to be
In the wilderness with Thee
When Israel’s tribes pursued their desert way.
Leaving the Red Sea strand
To find the Promised Land,
Thou shepherdest thy flock by night and day.
So great a change in that one night!
Pharaoh no more, the God of gods was then their risen light.
Treading the deep sea floor,
Dry shod from shore to shore,
The wall of waters piled on either hand;
Hearing the rushing waves
Fill up the Egyptians’ graves,
The foremost vainly struggling for the land,
Thee would I love with all my soul,
My heart should rove no more; God should possess the whole.
Encamped where Elim spread
Her palm-trees overhead,
With wells of water springing all around,
Not the new-found fruit
Would so my longings suit,
Nor the cold water from the pebbly ground
Could so revive my spirit there,
As when in some still place I sought my God in prayer.
Now moves the ransomed host
Far from the sea-washed coast,
And plunges deep where foot hath seldom trod;
And see that cloud by day
Marking out their way,
Guiding them safe as by a royal road.
My God, I could not see that sign,
And not with rapture cry, My soul, this God is thine!
And when the night came on,
The fading twilight gone,
Or whether storms or stars should fill the sphere,
That pillared cloud grew bright
With more than earthly light;
No need of words to whisper, God is here.
Finding some place beneath the sky,
My God, my very present God! nightly I’d cry.
When manna strews the ground,
And quails the camp surround,
And when the rock breaks forth in living streams,
And cities walled to heaven
To them are freely given,
Wonders of grace, exceeding all their dreams,
My God! each day and hour I’d be,
With heart and soul, a living sacrifice to thee.
To see the words in stone
Graven by God alone,
To hear the voice which from the darkness spake,
To see the man of God
Trail his princely rod,
And cry, “Forbear! my soul doth fear and quake.”
Oh, could I ever sin again!
Would not my soul become thy living temple then?
Behold the priest-borne ark
Resting in Jordan; mark!
It tarries till the host are all passed o’er,
Then slowly leaves the stream;
The friendly waters seem
Listing till every foot has reached the shore.
How sweet to live, how safe to die,
That wondrous ark of God before me passing by!
But pause, my soul! and see
If Israel’s God to thee
Hath not approached in loving-kindness nigher;
What place like Bethlehem!
The Saviour’s footprints deem
Steps leading up to God, ascending higher.
Hast thou forgot Gethsemane?
The world’s four thousand years had not a Calvary.
How hast thou loved and prayed?
How feared, adored, obeyed?
Is God in Christ less than a pillared cloud?
Are words he wrote in stone
More than the Word, his Son?
Is not “the living way” the better road?
Surely, whate’er thine eyes can see
In Israel’s favored lot, falls far this side of thee.
Awake! awake! my powers,
And Israel’s God and ours
Love, serve, and worship with a double flame;
God’s ancient methods learn;
The elder Scripture turn,
Tracing therein the great Immanuel’s name.
So shall thy worship perfect be,
And both the Testaments shall shine full orbed o’er thee.